Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 29645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 148(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 29645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 148(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
Her eyes widen, then her mouth curves slow. “You said it.”
“I didn’t.”
“You did.”
“I didn’t,” I repeat, then step back, because the warmth in her smile is dangerous. “Get to work.”
Sadie turns back to the wall, shoulders squared, but I catch the way her fingers tremble slightly around the pen.
Good.
Not because I want to hurt her.
Because I want her to feel it too.
Ash strolls back in with a grin that could be used as a weapon. “So, Lieutenant—should we install that sprinkler system now or wait until you two spontaneously combust?”
I don’t look away from Sadie. “Wait.”
“Smart,” Ash says. “Budget’s tight.”
Sadie keeps writing, but her voice floats over her shoulder, sweet as poison. “If you install sprinklers, I’m billing the firehouse for water damage.”
Axel whoops from the kitchen. “She’s perfect!”
I rub a hand over my jaw, forcing my face back into something neutral. Professional. Unshakable.
But inside?
Inside, the old flame isn’t dead.
It’s just been waiting.
And Sadie Marshall just walked in with a match.
Chapter 2
Sadie
Iknew coming back to Devil’s Peak would mean seeing Levi Kane again.
I just didn’t prepare for the way he’d look at me like I was both a problem and a memory he’d never finished burning.
The firehouse smells the same—diesel, coffee, metal, smoke baked into concrete. But he doesn’t.
He’s bigger. Broader through the shoulders. His jaw sharper, stubble darker, a faint crease between his brows that wasn’t there when we were eighteen and invincible and stupid in love. He stands in the engine bay like he owns the building, like the mountain itself signed over its authority to him.
“Intern Marshall,” he says when I walk in.
Lieutenant Kane.
We trade titles like weapons.
But when he muttered “Hotshot” under his breath earlier, like it slips out of muscle memory, something in my chest folds in on itself.
Because that name was never professional.
That name was mine.
I tell myself I left back then because I needed more.
More than Friday night football games and diner coffee refills and whispers about who’d marry who before twenty-five. I needed scholarships and cities and to know if I could survive outside the shadow of my father’s fire chief badge. I needed an identity that wasn’t just “Levi’s girl.”
But standing in front of him now?
It feels like I left something unfinished. Like I packed my bags and forgot to take my own heart with me.
I’m halfway through reviewing equipment inventory when the church ladies invade.
You can hear them before you see them—heels clicking, voices layered in sugary authority.
“Oh, there he is!” Mrs. Dottie Henderson trills as she sweeps into the bay like she owns the place. Behind her trail three other women armed with clipboards and foil-covered casserole dishes.
Spring Fundraising Season has begun.
Which, in Devil’s Peak, is basically a competitive sport.
Levi stiffens beside me. He doesn’t look scared—he looks hunted.
“Lieutenant Kane,” Mrs. Dottie purrs, pressing a hand to his arm like she’s inspecting produce. “We were just discussing eligible bachelors for this year’s charity events.”
His jaw ticks.
“Ma’am,” he says evenly.
I bite my lip to keep from smiling.
She circles him slowly. “You are single, aren’t you?”
The crew scatters like cowards.
Axel disappears into the kitchen. Ash pretends to polish a tool with intense concentration. My father is nowhere to be found.
Levi stands there, steady and broad and very much cornered.
“Oh dear,” Mrs. Dottie continues, tapping her pen against her clipboard. “The widows at church will be delighted.”
I lean closer to Levi, lowering my voice. “Wow. You must feel like a hunk of manmeat.”
His eyes cut to me.
Dangerous.
“You think this is funny?” he murmurs.
“A little.”
Mrs. Dottie beams at me. “Sadie! Sweetheart! You just got back from college, didn’t you? Such a bright young woman.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I say sweetly.
She pats my cheek like I’m still ten. “And still single?”
Levi’s head snaps toward me.
I fight the urge to grin.
“Very,” I say.
Mrs. Dottie nods approvingly. “Well! The Mountain Debutante Ball is coming up. We’ll need volunteers.”
Levi mutters something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like a curse.
The women cluster around him again, discussing charity auctions, baseball games, bake sales, and a car wash event titled Firefighters & Foam that makes my eyebrows rise.
“You’ll be auctioned for dinner dates, of course,” Mrs. Dottie informs him brightly. “It’s for a good cause.”
His shoulders go rigid.
I step closer, brushing my elbow against his. He’s solid. Warm. Real.
“They’re going to sell you,” I whisper.
“I gathered,” he says through clenched teeth.
“You’ll fetch a good price.”
He looks down at me slowly. “Careful, Hotshot.”
The nickname lands like lightning.
I stop breathing for half a second.
He notices.
His gaze flicks to my mouth before snapping back up.
“Still can’t help yourself, huh?” I say lightly.
“Still can’t stay out of trouble,” he shoots back.
Mrs. Dottie claps her hands. “Wonderful! We’ll put you down for the baseball game, the car wash, the dance lesson night, and—oh!—the maybe even the kiss cam fundraiser if we find you a match before then!”